Has anyone here ever leased a car?
 

I'm thinking of doing it but never did it before. Any advice for me or things I should know about?

I just moved to a new city and need to get a car, but on know how long I'll be here so think leasing is a good option.

Yeah, 9 times out of ten on a three year lease, you will go over the miles, and cause some sort of damage that they will charge you for. I did it once. Never again, for personal use.

lots of fees, there are several pros as well.

You can negotiate the price of the car down, thus lowering your lease payments. Most leases are at sticker, drive it down just like you were buying the car. Question the percentage rate, drive up the miles allowed.

Walk if you don't get what you want.

do i HAVE to lease for 3 years, or can I find less?
I dont know if Im going to stay here forever yet, im just kind of getting settled in

The better the resale value the lower your payment should be. Pick a model that retains it;s value.

Monthly payment is a result of the following.
Amount financed, percentage rate used, value at lease end.

better off to buy, end up paying alot more. and they don't tell you about alot of shit that isn't covered by the lease.

The shorter the lease the higher your payments will be.

Why, you are paying for the initial deprecation every car has the minute it leaves the lot in a more compressed period of time.

good stuff, thanks a lot for the info

Id rather lease a shitbox if I could.
I dont need a year 2007, a year 2000 car is fine for me.

Taxes.

On a personal lease you are using after-tax money to rent something that is depreciating.

A Corporate/business lease is paid with pre-tax money. Your savings is whatever your tax bracket is. (basically)

Once you agree on the price there is no real total cost difference. When you lease a new car for 3 years your lease payments = the amount the car depreciates in 3 years.

If you had paid cash, financed or leased; the vehicle will still be worth the same amount in 3 years no matter how you paid for it..

For this reason your lease payments for business vehicles are easily deducted as the lease payment is the actual depreciation. If a business bought instead of leased then they have to depreciate it differently over time.

Buy something like a 2-3 year old Toyota Camry, lowest mileage possible ... sell it when you are ready to move on. Your net cost divided by months owned will be very cheap. :2 cents:

I wont deduct the payments as a business expense on my taxes. Its personal use anyways.
I got audited by the IRS a few years ago for strange deductions my account at the time gave me on my taxes. I hated having to explain to them what content it, what traffic is, etc, lol.

I agree with you but I cant afford it atm so I need low monthly payments. I just moved and Im investing all of my cash into a new business venture so it leaves me with little to play with.

I'm leasing a vehicle right now. I wouldn't lease unless you have a reason TO lease. It doesn't really seem like you do, so I would just buy then sell.

If you drive a lot, then you need to buy, unless you can find someone foolish enough to give you an openended lease

actually I just found this site
http://www.swapalease.com
this look good? you can take over other peoples leases. that sounds perfect for me, so im not tied to anything if I decide not to stay in california

Lease for the shortest term possible, (24 months usually) you are more likely to outgrow or get tired of your car than vice versa.

Never lease a pre-owned car, because the residual is lower you end up paying near what you would for a new car and even if its certified it doesnt mean that it hasnt been in some accident or had other issues that you may end up being liable for when you return it. (Although they only charge y ou 80% of excessive wear and tear).

If you get a luxury car have them include the wheel and tire insurance and excessive wear and tear insurance, this can be added to your monthly payments and a good dealer will do it at almost no additional cost and it saves you quite a few headaches in the long run.

Usually you can save on miles if you pre-buy them, but you dont have to do it when you sign the lease, as long as you have 4+ months remaining you could probably get a .5 cent discount, from .25 to .20, etc. but check with the car manufacturer to be sure.

Lease gives you a great tax write off because you are allowed to write off $15,000 per year per car, vs only I believe $4,000 for a traditional finance + interest fees.

As long as the car is well maintained and you dont get into any serious accidents you also get to return the car after you have enjoyed it and moved on to something new. Good for people with short attention spans.

:thumbsup

Traditional leases are few and far between now a days. Financing companies have learned that balloon based or residual based financing is better for all parties involved.

In a traditional lease you are basically renting a car for 1/2/3 years, after your term expires you return to the dealership and give the car back. That is when the dealership will go check you mileage and wear and tear to make sure its with in what is stipulated in your contract.

The newer residual flex buys work a little different,
first off the buy price is negotiable, once price and term is settled upon a set formula is used to determine the "end lease" value of the car, the number turns into your balloon payment.
Now fastforward 2-3 years when the lease is about to expire, unlike a traditional lease where you have to turn the car now you have options

1. You can turn the car into the dealer, he will then go out inspect the car and probably try and charge you extra for mileage. Walk away and youre done

2. You can straight up purchase the car because you fell inlove with it, either stroke a check or finance it through a lender of your choice

3. Use it as a trade in on another make/model, this is the big one here. an example would be your lease expires this January and while you really liked your BMW, the porn gods have smiled upon you this year and fattened your bank account by a large margin so you want a (Porsche/Ferrari/Lambo).
You would take your BMW to which ever new dealership you are purchusing your car from and tell them you have a trade in, they will ask if there is a balance owed and you will let them know yes, give them the figure and its like any other trade in / purchase deal.


I spent close 8 years in the Auto sales/finance business working for Volvo to Lexus and BMW and from i have seen this type of purchse is great for peple who dont drive their cars into the ground. Some people buy a car pay it off and never want a another car payment, those people shouldnt do this. But if you like to get a new car every few years this what you need to do, the way the financing is setup I never saw anyone get upside on this type of purchase. Never buy more miles, 9 times out of 10 you will trading the car in and you wont get any sort of mileage hit if you went over your alloted 10k a year.

I hope this helps

I've leased 13 vehicles so far and there are some tricks to it.

Never ever go in thinking you'll put down a down payment.

The best month to pick up a cheap lease is December. So if you
can be happy with a 2006 on the lot you can get that pretty cheap.

The only leases that are worth it are 24 or 36 month leases.

If you go for the 36 month lease make sure you get 15,000 miles per year.

Short term interest rates determine the payments and right now
you can get a good 24 month lease because the car makers are
giving zero interest leases but they do limit the milage to 12,000
miles per year.

Don't buy any of the shit they try to add on like insurance or extended
drive train coverage or any of that shit. My last lease they tried to sell me $300 carpet cleaning !


Finally, go to one place and get the best lease price you can get with zero down on the car you want then go to all the other dealers and get them to beat the price with all taxes included etc..

I've found that the payment will go down $100-$200 per month after you blow them off for a week or so and in December they will go pretty low !

don't take the insurance.. :D

some great advice in this thread :thumbsup

Is it me, or are cars more expensive in California?

Interesting read, I was thinking about getting something in place of my truck

I do when ever I drive long distances to save my car .. and like woj said no need for extra insurance ;)

leasing is for idiots who like to lose all their $

this is my 5th lease and love it, have the car for 2 years and return it to them, if you drive a lot which i do it get a lil pricey in the end I usually end up paying between 500-1000 on overage of miles

never leased a car...

You can get them to ad some miles and you can pay for some extra miles up front. If you drive shit loads you are better off buying. For me I like a nice car and live where they salt the roads. Cars fall apart after 4 or 5 years so why own.

I think it's better to buy one than to lease. Just trade it in every 3 yrs (when the warranty is up usually). It's better to have a monthly car payment, than a vehicle breaking down and being serviced on all the time, and taking chunks of cash out of your pocket per problem/maintance.

Also, the better your credit score, the better % you'll get (sometimes you can even get 0% financing). When you lease, you're not putting money towards something you own. Might as well put your money towards something that is yours.

This is true. We just bought a 2006 Ford F-150 for $20k (sticker price was $29k) :) We bought it in late Oct.

I love getting new cars every few years and only drive them until the warranty expires. Leasing is perfect for me. I've never had a problem going over miles or damages - just take care of the damn thing!

I've lost more money buying and selling than leasing. Make sure you get a decently high end car with a high residual and your payments will be lower. Also don't pay more than a car payment as a downpayment. Mercedes wanted me to put down $5K on a lease. Thanks, but no thanks.

I'll add I've also had a second car that I've owned outright when I lease. But I've almost always had 2 cars even when I was buying them.

I always lease my cars. I'm not into big flashy cars I just can't see spending all that money for what i use them for. I do wish i had some of this info before I got the new cars last week but i think i did ok. My wife had an Acura TL Type -S but wanted something a bit bigger (she just runs the kids around local). I picked up the Honda Pilot Loaded and she loves it (I leased that one 24 months/12k a year) and I needed something to drive to work so I bought a 2004 Honda Accord loaded with 32K miles on it. It's fully loaded and gets good gas mileage ... plus i don't have to worry about going over on the mileage. the SUV was only like $36k and the car I got for $15K . but I like the Honda's/Acura's .. I've been leasing their products for years and never have any problem.

a friend of me leased one but before end of leasing the car had too many damages so he gave it back after 2 years, but during that time he paid them 2 times more than the actual car value

Great thread: I was thinking of leasing, but I think I'll steer clear.

my last lease for 3 years had to pay $189 USD for over miles . . .no damage, no probs

Every lease I've had they've sent someone to the house about 2 weeks before I turn it into the dealer and do a check on it. If there's something wrong, they point it out and I've been able to fix it before turning it in. For instance, my tire tread was lower than acceptable. The guy said the dealer would charge more for the tires than getting new ones, so I put new ones one before turning the car in (which I should have done before the inspection anyway........).

If you put a lot of miles on your car or want to drive it more than 2-3 years, leasing is NOT a good idea.

It's nice to hear from the people who have loads of cash about how they get a brand new high end car every other year, but Im on a small budget and close to broke, and need a car lol.
The business tanked for me and Im trying to rebuild.
In the meantime I need wheels, so just trying to get into something small and low end until I can get back on my feet :)

Buy an older Honda, Nissan or Toyota. Get it inspected by an independent inspector before you buy it (about $100). Accords, Civics, Camrys, Corollas, Maximas, and Sentras are good cars which if they have been taken care of, will last forever.